Wilmington Plc Acquires Conversia for €121.6 Million to Expand RegTech Solutions

Wilmington Plc completed the acquisition of Spanish regulatory technology provider Professional Group Conversia for €121.6 million, betting that soaring compliance costs and aggressive enforcement will drive European businesses toward automated solutions for navigating data privacy laws. The deal, which closed in early December after receiving Foreign Direct Investment clearance on November 28, marks the London-based company’s largest transaction and its entry into a RegTech sector that Fortune Business Insights projects will expand from $15.80 billion in 2024 to $82.77 billion by 2032.

The acquisition positions Wilmington Plc to capitalize on a compliance crisis affecting millions of small and medium-sized enterprises across Europe. Spain alone has issued more than 980 GDPR fines since the regulation took effect in 2018, with enforcement authorities targeting smaller businesses that lack dedicated compliance staff. Cumulative penalties across the European Union reached €5.88 billion through 2,245 recorded violations by 2025, according to compliance tracker CMS, creating urgency among mid-market companies to implement robust data protection frameworks before regulators arrive. Chief Executive Mark Milner said the transaction strengthens the company’s position in governance, risk, and compliance markets while diversifying its portfolio beyond traditional strongholds in financial services training and legal information.

Conversia operates proprietary software that automates the bureaucratic machinery of GDPR compliance for Spain’s 3.2 million SMEs and homeowner associations. The Barcelona-based firm’s platform handles data protection impact assessments, manages consent records, tracks data subject access requests, and generates documentation required by Spain’s AEPD, the independent supervisory authority responsible for enforcing privacy laws. The system addresses a fundamental problem confronting smaller businesses, where GDPR implementation created stringent obligations that disproportionately burden organizations without in-house legal teams. Research published in the Journal of Small Business and Enterprise Development found that Catalonian tech startups face interconnected compliance challenges spanning technical complexity, regulatory interpretation, staff training requirements, and costs that smaller firms struggle to absorb.

Alfonso Corral founded Conversia in 2018 to capitalize on demand created when GDPR transformed data protection from administrative formality into complex legal requirement. The regulation imposed uniform standards across EU member states, including mandatory record-keeping of processing activities, notification of data breaches within 72 hours, and implementation of privacy by design principles. Conversia’s automation reduces manual compliance work by up to 80% according to industry estimates, allowing organizations to meet obligations without hiring specialized data protection officers. The company serves more than 4,500 clients across Spain, Portugal, and Latin America, with particular strength among law firms, accounting practices, and mid-market companies that need enterprise-grade tools at accessible price points.

The business generated €36.6 million in revenue and €9.3 million in EBITDA for the year ended June 30, 2025, with more than 70 percent of revenue recurring annually through subscription arrangements. Conversia has posted double-digit revenue growth rates in recent years while expanding profit margins, operating a model where predictable cash flows insulate the business from economic volatility. Wilmington Plc funded the acquisition through £35 million from existing resources and £70 million in new debt facilities arranged with HSBC Innovation Bank and Barclays Bank, bringing leverage to approximately two times EBITDA at completion. The financing structure reflects confidence in subscription economics that have become standard across software businesses serving regulated industries.

Wilmington Plc operates established brands including Ark Group, Pendragon, and CLT, which provide compliance training, legal information services, and regulatory updates to professional services firms in approximately 120 countries. For fiscal 2025 ended June 30, the company reported ongoing revenue of £99.5 million, up 11% from the prior year, with adjusted operating profit from ongoing businesses reaching £30.3 million. The Training & Education division achieved 15% organic revenue growth while Intelligence brands posted 3% gains as Wilmington Plc pivoted from traditional print publishing toward digital subscription models that deliver higher margins.

Conversia’s technology capabilities create cross-selling opportunities across Wilmington Plc’s existing customer base of more than 15,000 organizations, particularly within its financial services vertical which generated £68 million in revenue during fiscal 2025. Banks and asset managers face mounting regulatory complexity spanning anti-money laundering directives, transaction reporting mandates, and data privacy requirements that create demand for integrated GRC platforms. Industry analysts tracking RegTech adoption report that 80% of financial institutions now rely on compliance software to meet obligations, with AI-powered systems increasingly handling transaction monitoring and regulatory change management. Management indicated that Conversia will serve as the foundation for developing a unified RegTech platform across Wilmington Plc’s portfolio, with plans to migrate multiple business units onto shared technical architecture that reduces costs while accelerating feature deployment.

The deal follows Wilmington Plc’s disposal of Compliance Week in February 2025 and its October 2024 acquisition of Phoenix Health & Safety for £30.25 million, reflecting a strategy to exit subscale operations while acquiring businesses with strong recurring revenue characteristics. The company has completed nine acquisitions since beginning its strategic repositioning, with Conversia marking its first entry into data privacy, one of the fastest-growing RegTech verticals. The European GRC software market reached €15.86 billion in 2025 and is projected to grow to €27.08 billion by 2033 at a compound annual growth rate of 6.92 percent, according to Market Data Forecast. Small enterprises represent the fastest-growing adoption category, with projected growth exceeding 15 percent annually as cloud-based solutions become accessible to organizations that previously could not justify capital expenditure for on-premise systems.

Spain leads GDPR enforcement frequency with 932 fines, though authorities focus on volume over size and target mid-market businesses rather than the massive penalties Ireland’s Data Protection Commission levies against Big Tech platforms. This enforcement pattern creates acute pressure on companies Conversia serves, where a single violation can represent material financial exposure relative to operating budgets. The Spanish Data Protection Agency has developed resources to promote compliance among SMEs, recognizing that smaller organizations require accessible solutions to navigate complex requirements. RegTech platforms address these obligations through workflow automation that embeds compliance into business operations rather than treating data protection as reactive paperwork, allowing organizations to demonstrate accountability through automated audit trails.

Data protection regulations modeled on GDPR have proliferated globally, with jurisdictions from Brazil to California implementing comprehensive privacy frameworks that create compliance obligations for any organization processing resident data. This regulatory fragmentation increases complexity for businesses operating across multiple markets, driving demand for platforms that can manage requirements spanning different legal regimes through configurable workflows and jurisdiction-specific documentation templates. Over 75% of businesses globally have adopted some form of compliance software to mitigate data risks, with adoption accelerating as enforcement intensifies and organizations recognize that manual processes cannot scale to meet evolving obligations.

Conversia’s management team is incentivized to remain with the business for a minimum of five years under the acquisition agreement, providing continuity as Wilmington Plc integrates the platform across its portfolio. Corral will continue as Director General, bringing expertise in Spanish regulatory markets and relationships with professional services firms that constitute the core customer base. Wilmington Plc expects the acquisition to be earnings accretive in its first full year of ownership, though the company did not disclose specific profit contribution targets in regulatory announcements. The company’s shares have performed well as investors responded to its strategic repositioning toward higher-margin software businesses, with management expressing confidence that organic growth initiatives combined with strategic acquisitions position it for continued expansion in target GRC markets where regulatory complexity shows no signs of abating.